Constitution of the State of Coahuila and Texas (1827)

TITLE III.

JUDICIAL POWER.

SOLE SECTION.

Administration of Justice in general.

ART. 168. The administration of justice in civil and criminal cases
shall exclusively belong to the tribunals and courts of justice which
agreeably to the constitution should exercise the judicial power.

ART. 169. Neither congress, or the governor can remove cases pending
from an inferior to a superior court; nor can tribunals and courts of
justice themselves open those already concluded.

ART. 170. Every inhabitant of the state shall be judged by competent
tribunals and judges, established prior to the act by which he is
judged, and in no way by special commission, or retroactive law.

ART. 171. The laws shall regulate the order and formalities to be
observed in suits at law. These shall be uniform in all the courts of
justice and tribunals, and no authority can dispense therewith.

ART. 172. The tribunals and courts of justice, being authorised
solely for applying the laws, shall never interpret the same, or suspend
their execution.

ART. 173. Military men and ecclesiastics, residing in the state,
shall continue subject to their respective authorities.

ART. 174. No affair shall have more than three processes, and a like
number of determinate decisions. The law shall provide which of said
sentences shall produce a warrant of attorney, and from said sentence no
other appeal shall be admitted than that of nullity, in the form, and
for the purposes the law provides.

ART. 175. A judge who has rendered a decision in a case, in any
process thereof, cannot take cognizance anew in any other process
whatever, or in appeal of nullity interposed in said case.

ART. 176. Bribery, subornation and prevarication are ground for
public action against the magistrate or judge who should commit the
same.

ART. 177. Justice shall be administered in the name of the state, in
the manner the laws prescribe.

PARAGRAPH FIRST.

Administration of Justice in Civil Matters.

ART. 178. Every inhabitant of the state shall be perfectly free to
terminate his controversies, whatever be the state of the trial, by
means of arbitrators, or in any other extrajudicial manner. His
agreements in this particular shall be strictly observed, and the
decisions of arbitrators executed, should the parties on making the
mutual promise not reserve the right of appeal.

ART. 179. Cases of a small amount shall be terminated by executive
measures which shall be executed without any recourse. A particular law
shall fix the sum and mode of proceeding therein.

ART. 180. In other civil and criminal matters in respect to wrongs
there shall be a trial by conciliation, and without proving that this
means has been attempted a trial by writing cannot be established except
in cases which the law itself shall determine.

PARAGRAPH SECOND

Administration of Justice in Criminal Matters.

ART. 181. All criminal actions, for light transgressions that should
be punished by correctional penalties, shall be decided by executive
judgment without the form or shape of trial, and from the result no
appeal, or any other recourse can be interposed. The law shall assign
said penalties, and determine the crimes to which they correspond.

ART. 182. In grave offences summary information of the fact shall be
drawn up authoritatively, without which requisite and that of the
corresponding consequent warrant that shall be notified in the accused,
and a copy thereof communicated to the jailor, no person can be a
prisoner.

ART. 183. Should the judges not be able immediately to fulfil the
provision of the preceding articles, the person arrested shall not be
considered a prisoner but in the light of one detained, and should the
jail warrant not be made known to him within forty-eight hours, and
communicated to the jailor, he shall be discharged.

ART. 184. A person who gives bail in said cases, wherein it is not
expressly prohibited by law, shall not be taken to prison, and in
whatever state of the cause it appears that corporal penalty cannot be
imposed on the prisoner, he shall be released under bail.

ART. 185. Those who have to declare in criminal matters upon their
own actions shall do so without being under oath.

ART. 186. All persons may arrest a delinquent in the act, and conduct
him to the presence of the judge.

ART. 187. The greatest care shall be taken that the jails serve only
for securing, and not for molesting the accused.

ART. 188. Criminal causes shall be public, in the manner and form the
laws provide, as soon as it is proposed to receive the declaration of
the accused in reply to the charges.

ART. 189. The confiscation of property shall forever be prohibited,
and even the seizure thereof can only be effected on proceeding in
crimes involving a pecuniary reponsibility, and only in proportion
thereto.

ART. 190. Torture and compulsion shall never be used, and penalties
imposed, whatever be the crimes, shall never pass to the family of him
who suffers them, but they shall have their effect solely upon the
person who deserved them.

ART. 191. No authority of the state can issue a mandate for searching
the houses, papers, and other effects of the inhabitants thereof, except
in those cases, and in the form, the laws provide.

ART. 192. One of the main objects of attention of congress shall be
to establish the trial by jury in criminal cases, to extend the same
gradually, and even to adopt it in civil cases in proportion as the
advantages of this valuable institution become practically known.

PARAGRAPH THIRD.

Inferior Courts of Justice and Superior Tribunals.

ART. 193. The inferior courts of justice shall continue in the manner
and form that shall be prescribed by law, until in the judgement of
congress the state rents permit the establishment of learned judges, who
shall be appointed in each district.

ART. 194. In the capital of the state there shall be a supreme
tribunal divided into three halls, each composed of the magistrate or
magistrates whom the law designated, and said tribunal shall have a
fiscal, who shall despatch all the subjects of the three halls. Should
the hall consist of one minister only, said special law shall determine
whether colleagues should be appointed, and the manner and form it shall
be done.

ART. 195. The first two halls shall take cognizance in the second and
third processes of civil cases, of inferior courts of justice, and also
of criminal cases according as the laws determine.

ART. 196. It shall belong to the third hall,

First,--to decide the power of inferior judges.

Second,--Determine appeals of nullity, interposed from
executing judgements in first, second and third processes.

Third,--Take cognizance in all compulsive appeals interposed
from the ecclesiastical tribunals and authorities of the state.

Fourth,--Examine the lists that shall be transmitted to the
same monthly, of causes pending in first, second and third processes
communicate a copy thereof to the governor, and provide for their
publication through the press.

Fifth,--Hear doubts of law that occur to the two first halls,
and to the primary tribunals, and communicate them to congress, through
the channel of the governor, accompanied by the corresponding report.

ART. 197. Actions for transgressions in office entered against
inferior judges, and also those formed for crimes of the same kind, and
those in general against the deputies of congress, the governor and vice
governor, counsellors, secretary of state, and members of the tribunal
of justice shall be opened and closed in all their processes before the
said supreme tribunal. The law shall mark out the other powers of the
same and its respective halls.

ART. 198. In case an action ought to be entered against the whole
tribunal, or any of its halls, congress shall appoint another special
tribunal, composed of the corresponding halls and the latter of the
magistrate or magistrates considered necessary.

ART. 199. The special tribunal appointed by congress for these cases
shall take cognizance of all appeals of nullity in actions of the
supreme tribunal of justice, in those of the individuals mentioned in
the preceding article, and in subjects pertaining to the third hall.

ART. 200. To be a magistrate or fiscal it shall be required to be a
citizen in the exercise of his rights over twenty-five years of age, a
native of this republic, and an upright and enlightened lawyer.

ART. 201. Both magistrates and fiscal shall be appointed by congress
on nomination by the executive. They shall receive a competent salary,
to be designated by law, and cannot be removed from office, except from
a legally established cause.

ART. 202. The members of the supreme tribunal of justice shall be
responsible for all their proceedings in the discharge of their
functions, and may be accused therefor before congress by any individual
of the people whatever.